In a statement issued to the London Stock Exchange (LSE), epiwafer foundry and substrate maker IQE plc of Cardiff, Wales, UK has a potential “significant acquisition”.
This follows UK newspaper The Times reporting that, to fund the possible acquisition, IQE was is in the process of raising pound 17.5m by selling 70 million new shares at 0.25 pence each, via broker Canaccord Genuity. IQE’s shares are traded on the AIM market of the LSE, and the firm has a market capitalization of about pound 170m ($273m).
IQE confirms that it is evaluating the financing options, which include debt finance and equity finance. However, it adds that the pricing, sizing and terms of any equity financing will be subject to market conditions and demand, and that there can be no certainty that any transaction will occur (or its terms and conditions). The firm says that it will update the market in due course.
In the past year IQE has already made two acquisitions. In February 2012 it raised pound 10.5m (via a placing with institutional investors of 43.75 million shares at 24 pence each) to take a 9% stake in Solar Junction Corp (SJC) of San Jose, CA, USA. Solar Junction makes molecular beam epitaxy (MBE)-based III-V multi-junction solar cells for concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) modules, and the deal also provides IQE with an exclusive seven-year epiwafer supply contract as well as exclusive rights to supply all of SJC’s products. Last June IQE acquired the MBE epiwafer manufacturing unit of RF Micro Devices Inc of Greensboro, NC, USA. As part of that deal, IQE also secured a long-term wafer supply agreement for the exclusive provision of all of RFMD’s MBE wafers and for the provision of a majority of its metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) wafer requirements.
